


Inarticulate

by Irony_Rocks



Category: Stargate: Atlantis
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-10-15
Updated: 2010-10-15
Packaged: 2017-10-12 16:41:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,413
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/126928
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Irony_Rocks/pseuds/Irony_Rocks
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Return-based fic. The three of them, together, don't make sense here. Nothing does. It isn't like Atlantis, and the same rules – or disregards for them and other taboos - don't apply.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Inarticulate

\--

Dinner is awkward, painfully silent, and Elizabeth wonders if maybe she should have somehow avoided this after all. John and Rodney try to fill the silence, but she can't quite match their efforts word for word. The walls of the restaurant seem to close in on her, and the noise and pressure have a claustrophobic effect. It's a sharp, stinging contrast to the seclusion she's become so used to.

Carson hasn't even been able to make it to dinner himself, even after going through all that effort to get her to come to dinner tonight. She hasn't seen either of these two men in six weeks, three days and a handful of hours, but the separation feels as fresh as it had been the day after she had left them both standing in the lot outside Cheyenne mountain. There had been a promise on her lips to see them soon, except that had been nothing but hollow words - a fib, a blatant lie to make her escape and seclusion easier to manage.

Rodney's been persistently calling and leaving messages on her phone since then. He's even stopped by unexpectedly at her doorstep a couple of times, but Elizabeth's become skilled at ducking her head and feigning a deaf ear to his knocks.

John? John is smarter. He knows she doesn't want to face what they all lost.

The three of them, together, don't make sense here. Nothing does. It isn't like Atlantis, and the same rules – or disregards for them - don't apply.

"So," Elizabeth says, mustering a smile. "What have you two been up to?"

John trades a look with Rodney, and god, she can still read them like an open book - Rodney's concern, John's hesitation, Rodney's misery, John's anger. She can tell a thousand different things from just one damn look, and it terrifies her because she knows they can read her just as well.

John sighs. "Let's get out of here. This place… it's a little too..." he trails off, unable to find the right words to describe the wrongness of it. "Let's just get the hell out of here."

Rodney agrees with the decision, muttering a pert jab at the restaurant that Elizabeth doesn't even register. They both rise from the table, grab their coats off their chairs, but Elizabeth freezes. Despite hating it here - hating the crowd and the noise and the stale air that smells nothing like salt - she hesitates because getting out of here means risking being alone with these two men. She's avoided exactly that for so long because she knows exactly where it will land her.

"Actually," she begins, "I was kinda hungr-"

"Elizabeth," John cuts in, his voice tired, a little grim. She knows he won't take any of her bullshit, not anymore, and a part of her hates him for that. "Let's go."

Rodney pays for their drinks, while John gets his car and picks them up out front. She slips into the passenger seat, and the awkwardness bleeds through the walls of the small space inside. She waits for one of them to break the hush, but neither seems to be making the effort anymore. The silence stretches for miles, and Elizabeth shifts in her seat, fidgets with the hair, tugs at the long sleeves of her red blouse. Restless and agitated, she realizes that she hasn't even been paying attention to where they're headed until they arrive.

John pulls up to his apartment building, parks his car, and both men exit the vehicle at once. She stays inside, and stares at the two.

"Elizabeth," Rodney says, half annoyed and half pleading. "Just come upstairs."

If she goes upstairs, she knows exactly what will happen. The certainty is so strong she can already feel the ghosts of their touch, the feel of their lips, the sound of their voices saying her name as they move over her body. She closes her eyes, and her body reacts to the memories, abruptly craves the contact, the heat, but more importantly, the _connection_ that she had severed so unceremoniously these last few weeks.

She doesn't even realize when she makes the decision, but she pulls open the car door and follows them upstairs.

Rodney helps her shrug off her coat and hangs it up. John retreats to the kitchen and comes back to hand her a bottle of beer. They're moving as a unit now, casually and normally as they did with her back in Atlantis, but there's not a shadow of doubt in her mind that they orchestrated this entire night, up to and including Carson's sudden withdrawal from dinner.

She takes a sip of her drink, moving across the room with her back to both of them. They're watching her, but she fixes her gaze on the view outside John's apartment. It isn't anything impressive, but Elizabeth stares out the window and for a moment, remembers the feel of a sea breeze across her face, whispering of home.

She knows the logistics of the night were sealed the moment she agreed to come upstairs. She's not stupid or blind, nor in denial no matter what others would think. She's been sleeping with both of these men for a little over a year in Atlantis, but the last six weeks may have destroyed that. Even accepting the invitation up to John's apartment, even knowing what was coming, Elizabeth isn't sure of her place among them. If she even _has_ a place anymore. Anywhere.

Which is why she drops her beer in surprise when Rodney's hand settles against the swell of her hip. The bottle shatters to the ground, splashing liquid across her clothes and spraying her pants with the ripe smell of beer. She pulls back abruptly, bumping into Rodney clumsily and then quickly moving away from him.

They apologize simultaneously, tripping over each other verbally as much as they had just done physically. The awkward maneuvering is more pained than embarrassing. There had been a time when Elizabeth had been able to anticipate Rodney's advances coming from a mile away; he had never been a particularly subtle man.

Her eyes slip shut for a second, and she can't help but think that this isn't working anymore. They don't fit together any longer, and she had been right all along to avoid this at all costs. It's another wound, another sharp slap across the face to realize that she really did lose her place in everything important in her life.

"I've got it," John says at length, breaking the silence.

He retreats into the kitchen again, and when he returns, there's a towel in his hands and he idly, casually, crouches down before her. Her words of protests are silenced before they even make it passed her lips as he begins wiping her legs down with long, strong sweeps of the towel. She can feel the firmness of his hands as he trails up and down her thighs, the pressure of it searing and alarmingly arousing as he dries the spilled liquid on her clothes. She remembers the feel of his callused, strong hands against her skin and her body coils tight with tension.

Before she can scramble for her next move, Rodney is behind her again, a solid barrier at her back. When he touches her this time, she doesn't flinch, doesn't move, doesn't do anything but hold unnaturally still as he hands circle her waist. John's eyes move to catch Rodney's over her shoulder, and a message is conveyed. Rodney's fingers curl against her belly and John's hands still on her thighs, and she has a moment to think, to remember, to feel the pressure of it all.

Her breath catches at the intensity of the simple touch, but her body has gone without contact for so long now. The dark and sober taste of desire that she had pushed down for so many weeks floods like a broken dam, and Elizabeth can't find her words.

Elizabeth twists her upper body to turn to Rodney first, and she wants to say something, anything, but she can't think of a damn thing. He saves her the trouble by capturing her mouth in a kiss that begins soft and lingers, his tongue brushing against her lips, seeking permission that she grants when she opens her mouth wider.

Rodney always starts his kisses off like this, always surprisingly soft with her, almost reverent if she didn't know better. It's his way of being gentle with her, tender because that's how Rodney has always treated her, how he thinks love and affection should be displayed. He's as passionate as John, but Rodney always takes the time to move slow in the beginning.

She cups his cheek with her hand, twisting her torso to shift their angle, deepening the kiss.

Even with her attention focused on Rodney, Elizabeth is still acutely aware of John crouched down before her, his hands resting on her thighs. She hears him release a soft groan, the distinct hint of desire in it lobbied at the performance he's witnessing.

John loves to watch, almost as much as he hates to sit out.

The towel drops to the ground, forgotten, and his fingers aren't like Rodney's - they're slim and long, not as wide as the fingers splayed across her stomach.

There's no hesitation, no uncertainty, no permission sought before John begins undoing her belt buckle. She breaks off her kiss with Rodney just as John expertly unfastens her pants with a single, fluid flick of his wrist. He quickly works the damp material down past the swell of her hips, and the entire time his eyes are singularly focused on his work, soaking up the sight of her skin as it exposes itself. He snags his fingers around the elastic of her panties, and roughly pulls them down the length of her legs.

His hands blaze a path up her thigh and when he leans forward to brush kisses along her inner thigh, Elizabeth swallows a moan and her knees go weak. Rodney's there behind her, supporting her, one hand holding her still around the waist, underneath her shirt, fingers splayed wide. The other hand molds over one of her breasts, kneading with pressure that hardens her nipples. Her breath hitches harshly, sinking her weight back into Rodney.

"So wet already, Elizabeth," John whispers, teasingly. He looks up at her with wolfish grin. "We haven't even done anything yet. Missed us that much?"

"There's too many stubborn people in this relationship," Rodney mutters into her ear, reprimanding and husky in the same breath. "She shouldn't have missed us at all."

Elizabeth almost responds, but John takes that moment to tease her the barely there touches and light kiss all along her inner thigh until she's almost whimpering with the need. When he rubs his thumb over her clit, between her folds, Elizabeth's body jolts with the pleasure and she cries out.

"There's our girl," John breathes, pulling his finger away almost immediately.

She whimpers at the withdrawal, and through half lidded eyes she sees him lick his thumb, tasting her wetness with a sweep of his tongue. Before she can recover, he leans forward to nuzzle her thigh with the scrap of his beard and the sensation draws a shudder from her.

Overwhelmed and pinned, she can't stop moaning the plea. "John, please."

"Please, what?" he asks huskily. She takes a moment to savor the way his mouth feels against her thigh, aching for him to just get to it already, when he repeats, "Please what, Elizabeth?"

"John," Rodney mutters near her ear. "Quit being a bastard or I'll start calling you Kirk again. In bed."

"And I'll start calling you Meredith." John turns towards her with a smirk, eyes dark, and sighs. "I'm just saying, you do realize we're gonna have to teach you a lesson about leaving us, right, Elizabeth?"

 _That_ gets a rise out of her. Elizabeth opens her mouth, a retort about teaching lessons and how he shouldn't be the one to talk poised on her lips--

And that's when John moves in and buries his face between her thighs. Elizabeth goes weak in the knees as he waste no time, licking her clit, trailing his tongue along her core, the spiking sensation piercing a cry from her lips immediately.

Her eyes slip shut and her head falls back onto Rodney's shoulders, and she struggles for breath as she clutches white-knuckled around Rodney's arms. She feels John's fingers skim along the curls of her hair, and Elizabeth fights back a shudder when her holds her wide open, his mouth moving greedily over her, latching onto her with suckling and licking and a twirling of his tongue across her opening - tiny, provoking circles threatening every shred of her sanity.

She can't stop her hips from bucking widely into John, but Rodney clutches at her body, holds her still where her own control is shattered. At first, the press of Rodney's erection against the back of her thigh barely registers against the overwhelming swirl of John's tongue, but as her hips shift and fight against the restraints of Rodney's hands, she pushes back into his erection and hears a sharp grunt. The sound manages to break through her haze and she uses the pressure that John's mouth inspires to urge her hips into a rocking sensation, pushing back against Rodney's hard-on as John eats her out.

By the time she comes, hot and wet, trembling around John, Rodney's breathing is nearly as ragged and thready as hers. She collapses entirely against Rodney, body convulsing with the aftermath of an orgasm.

"God, that's absurdly hot," Rodney whispers faintly.

Boneless and dazed, she watches as John and Rodney exchange a kiss with her body pinned between them. Her breasts are pressed hard against John's chest, and her back is flush against Rodney. She can feel both of them, the length of their arousals, pressing into her body from either side.

When they break off the kiss, she simply turns her head towards Rodney's neck and nuzzles his throat, her lips ghosting across the beat of his pulse. The quick intake of breath has her smiling softly, but then Rodney's hands fell from her waist and suddenly she was being pulled - quite literally - into John's arms.

This kiss is sharply possessive from the moment their lips meet. There is no playfulness, no gentle caress that Rodney demonstrated. John can be as achingly slow in his kisses - always gentle and caring to her needs when she makes it clear that's what she wants - but this kiss is entirely too raw, too heated, and Elizabeth immediately realizes that there's a wealth of frustration underneath. Maybe even anger?

She knows he's pissed at losing Atlantis; at his disappointing position in the SGC. That type of frustration makes sense to her because that's all she's been feeling since coming to Earth, but then another possibility occurs to her.

Is he angry at her? For leaving? Abandoning them when they came back to Earth?

She whimpers with the thought, but John takes the noise to mean something else entirely and intensity of the kiss increases as he cups the back of her head with his hand and backs her up. This time Rodney isn't there behind her and her backside hits a wall, her body slamming against the hard surface. The only thing that prevents her head from connecting with the wall is John's hand, cradling the back of her skull and tangled up in a mesh of dark curls. The kiss is aggressive, demanding, and Elizabeth can't catch her breath.

She pulls free from the bruising kiss, breathing his name in whisper, "John?"

"Shut up, Elizabeth," he says, and it sounds like an _order._

His mouth covers over hers again in another possessive kiss, and Elizabeth's body responds even as her mind scrambles for control. The press of John's body, and the urgency with which he kisses her belies something that shocks her in its intensity. Yes, she knew that he would miss her but she has always figured the two of them had would manage without her just fine. They have each other, after all.

Maybe she was wrong?

"I'm sorry," she breaths between the kisses, mindlessly, the words spilling without her permission. "I didn't know. I didn't realize."

The confession causes John to freeze, and he pulls back an inch to lock eyes with her. Behind him, Rodney lays a hand on his arm. "John," he says, almost cautiously, warning, like he's trying to fend off an explosion that Elizabeth doesn't see coming.

"Didn't realize?" John repeats, and the darkness of his voice makes her freeze, because she knows that tone. "Didn't realize what, Elizabeth? That cutting us out of your life would affect us? That we would actually _feel_ something about the way you--"

"John," Rodney cuts in, "that's enough. We weren't going to talk about this tonight."

"That was the plan," John acknowledges Rodney roughly, but his eyes are fixated on her, pinning her in place and silencing her voice with its intensity. "Tonight we were simply supposed to get you in bed, get you thoroughly fucked, and then we'd try to get you to crawl out of your damn self-imposed exile." He abruptly slams his hand against the wall behind her, the thud of it causing Elizabeth to flinch in alarm. "Damn it, Elizabeth! Why couldn't you just talk to us?!"

"John, that's enough!"

Rodney suddenly pulls John back by the shoulders, releasing Elizabeth from his rough hold. She doesn't collapse or fall, but her body is shaking and she stares wide-eyed at John.

"You should have talked to us," John says, furious. "And, god, that's coming from me! I don't particularly like to talk, but you _owed_ us that much. You--"

"I just needed time," she breaths unexpectedly, breaking her silence. Her hushed voice stops John mid-rant, and the words continue to fall from her lips. "You two had a place, had things to do, roles to fill and… and what I was supposed to do? Damn it, John! I just needed time to figure it out."

The words are inarticulate and awkwardly poised on her lips without any of the normal composure that language normally yields from her. Everybody else had things to do, a place still carved out on Earth for them. She may have had job opportunities lined up and waiting for her, but none of them had been right.

Her place is in Atlantis. Without her city, she has nothing left.

John breaks the hush. "You had a place with us," he counters, as if reading her mind. "We lost Atlantis, too. We didn't need to lose you as well."

When she doesn't respond, just stares at him as her eyes threaten to turn blurry, John whirls away and paces the length of the living room.

"Oh, great," Rodney snaps, turning to John. "You're trying to make her cry now? What part of our absurdly simplistic plan flew right over that hair of yours?!"

Elizabeth scrubs a hand over her face and straightens. "No, Rodney. He's right. I shouldn't--"

"We shouldn't have done a lot of things," Rodney counters. "It says something here that of the three of us, I'm the only one that's making efforts to move on. You became a hermit overnight and John goes through SG teams like tissue paper. Don't you get it? We're all that we have left!" Rodney walks over to her, emphasizing his point when he grabs her by the arms. "We're all that's left of Atlantis, Elizabeth."

She looks away, the words too raw and stinging. She's vaguely aware that John looks a little guilty now, the anger having given way just as abruptly as it had risen. He scrubs a hand through his hair, and then locks gazes with her. He doesn't even need to say anything and she can read him perfectly. He still needs time to calm down, so she doesn't stop him when he retreats into the kitchen, the door swinging shut after him.

Her throat closes off, and she tightens her arms around Rodney, and then without thinking, without planning, she kisses Rodney again. He tries to pull back, surprised, caught off-guard, but then Elizabeth cuts him off. "Rodney," she says, in a tone far gentler than the one John had used. "Shut up."

She kisses him again, her hand sliding down to palm the hilt of his belt buckle. She teases open his mouth in a way she learned he likes long ago, and then Rodney's responding, reciprocating, and actively maneuvering them to the bedroom. He hasn't tasted her in weeks now, and it's enough to have even Rodney's complaints ceasing as they make their way to the bed.

They strip themselves of clothes along the way and drop them like breadcrumbs for John to follow. She doesn't think about John, though, the pain still tight in her chest. She only thinks about Rodney and when she pushes him back on the mattress and straddles him between already wet and sticky thighs, it's his name she breathes.

She sinks down onto him, around him, hears him moan her name in return, and then she's moving, rocking, fucking him while beads of sweat slowly break out across her body as she works. The rhythm picks up and he reaches for her skin wherever he can, his hands skimming across her breasts, his body hard and warm as he thrusts up every time she moves down. The feel of slowly moving over him is too much, too right, and memories fly through her head.

She remembers why she loves this man so much, how she's one of only two people in the entire universe that have ever seen Rodney for who he really is. How he's gentle with her even when he's downright callous with everybody else. She hasn't allowed herself to think about that in _so_ long, and the surge of emotion nearly overwhelms her.

Something's still missing, though.

In the corner of the room, there's a full length mirror that catches the reflection of the bedroom door. She glances at it every so often, waiting for the moment when John finally appears in the lighted doorway. She levels a hand against Rodney's chest and doesn't silence her voice, wants the sound of them making love to reach across the apartment.

"Love you," Rodney breathes, choked.

He's been the only one of them that's ever admitted those words. John won't, and Elizabeth can't, but Rodney does.

Drawn to the bedroom by their activities, she finally sees John's silhouette as Rodney's breathing turns choked, close to finding release. She twists her thighs, shifting the angle of penetration, and forces Rodney's approaching orgasm back by drawing out his pleasure. He groans, eyes rolling back as he hisses her name. She slants and moves, grinding up and down. The performance is one she learned long ago, lengthening or shortening a man's enjoyment by a shift in her body's direction.

She leans down to kiss Rodney, half breathless and delirious with her own need. When she pulls back, her eyes catch the mirror, sees John watching them. His body is still poised in the doorway, frozen as he looks on and the length of his body is tense and rigid, looks almost painfully so. Then Rodney latches his mouth around one of her nipples and Elizabeth arches into him, and she hears an distinct rumble of an electric groan from behind them.

Faintly, she can see the mirror. She can see John's hand moving, touching himself. He doesn't move any closer to them, though, just watches, flushing with arousal as she continues to ride Rodney. The distance maintained pierces something deep within her, and whether he's enjoying the performance too much or, god, a part of him is still angry with her enough to stay away, Elizabeth is too lost to the feeling of Rodney beneath her to decide. She closes her eyes and fills her senses with the building momentum of her rhythm. John does nothing but watch, just watches, and she can clearly imagine his dark eyes roaming over her body, roaming over Rodney's, and Elizabeth whimpers.

Her orgasm looms and she can't breathe, can't speak, can't find a way to describe the way she's feeling except by the steady sway of her hips. Rodney comes first with a gasp, his release triggering her own, pushing her over the edge with an orgasm that sends spasms of euphoria racing through her body. Pleasure rolls over her and she slumps over Rodney's chest, riding the wave until her body stops shuddering with spasms.

There's a few moments of utter silence while Elizabeth tries to get her breathing under control, where she's thinking of absolutely nothing but the blissful hum of her body. She hears movement in the background, the rustle of clothing hitting the ground. Then she feels slim fingers slowly pushing away the hair from the nape of her neck. When John's lips latch onto her exposed skin, licking a trail up her sweat-coated neck, even fully satiated, a shiver runs through her body.

Before she fully recovers and responds with anything more than a faint moan, John lifts her carefully, slowly, from atop Rodney and turns over so she rests beside him with her back flat on the mattress.

"Damn it, Elizabeth," John breathes roughly, hovering above her. The hungry expression in his eyes goes right through her. "I'm never letting you out of this bed again."

He crawls up her body, presses her down against the bed and kisses her soundly. He stretches out on top of her, hands on either side of her, and Elizabeth arches up against him, drawing a hiss of a breath when she rubs her lower body against his hard-on. He pulls away from the kiss, breathing heavily, her name uttered in a broken whisper. She's forgotten the strength of that by half, the way her name sounds when uttered in his husky breath. Her body responds to it just like it always does.

"Missed you," he breathes in that jagged, little whisper against her throat, and Elizabeth knows it's a confession of something deeper. Words he'd never say out loud.

Satisfied already, Rodney turns on his side and stares at the performance. It's his turn to watch her and John, and Elizabeth realizes that they're lavishing all their attention on her tonight. They decided this, she belatedly realizes as John nuzzles her neck, just like they orchestrated everything else tonight.

She expects John to take her rough and hard, figures that his need after watching her with Rodney would make him impatient. Even without that, she hasn't slept with either of one of them in a little over six weeks and if Rodney was anything to judge by, John's sorely missed being with her like this. She figures all of that means hard and fast, with fingernail marks across John's back come morning.

She's surprised by the slow pace he sets, then. The kisses turn sensuous, unhurried, and having already come twice, Elizabeth doesn't speed up the pace. She's surprised by his self-restraint, though, and it isn't until she feels his hands skim across her ribs almost hesitantly that she realizes his slow pace has deeper meaning.

He kisses her gently, too gently for the anger that had been inside of him from before. It's a sharp, stinging contrast, and Elizabeth numbly realizes that despite his male bravado, underneath his skin sometimes rests a wholly insecure man. Weeks of separation have made him cautious and confused with her. It always shocks her that John ever feels insecure about anything, but he hides a wide, shaky foundation of abandonment issues under that cocky flyboy persona.

And for the last six weeks, she's abandoned him. Them.

Her body suddenly aches from something more than just physical need. It's guilt, overwhelming and real and a sound escapes her lips that sounds too much like a sob.

John stills. "Are you okay?"

She doesn't answer. Reaching up, wrapping hers arms around him to explore his mouth with her own, her exhausted state abruptly gets a second wind. She grinds the length of her body against his, encouraging John until he groans into the kiss, takes over and pushes her back onto the mattress. When she parts her legs wide and he finally pushes inside, she wants him to take her hard. Almost wants there to be pain involved; thinks she deserves it if there is. The emotions she's been repressing for so long suddenly threaten to shatter and release. She sobs again, the hitch of emotion covered by the moan of John's voice as he thrusts inside of her.

He pushes in until he's completely buried in the slick heat of her, and Elizabeth's head falls back onto the pillow, body curved like an arc. John mummers incoherent words against her neck, trailing kisses up her jaw and along her face.

Then his gruff voice is against her ear. "Shh, Elizabeth. I've got you now."

She holds onto him tightly, one hand around his neck as the other balls into a fist around the bed sheets. Then his hip thrusts into hers, hard, and she makes a tiny, incoherent sound of need in the back of her throat. The pressure builds every time he pulls out and pounds back into her, rough and fast and exactly like she wants it. Needs it.

When she turns her head to the side, she can see Rodney touching himself again, completely hard. His hand moves up and down over his shaft, and Elizabeth wants to find her voice to say something to Rodney, anything, but she can't do anything but mindlessly gasp for breath and hold on. She tries to force all thoughts to abandon her completely but the emotions are thick, overwhelming, and she can't fight them back even if she wanted to. The rhythm of their fucking and the words she can hear muttered against her skin, it all overwhelms hers.

John thrusts in and out, in and out, the harsh sound of his heavy breathing fusing with hers. She lets herself cry out, unrestrained unlike back in Atlantis. The thin walls don't stop her here, don't prevent her from calling out John's name. Or Rodney's. She doesn't care who hears her now. She has nothing left to lose except them.

She has missed them so damn much.

When she finally comes for the third time that night, she cries out and there are tears involved with the force of her orgasm. John bucks into her twice more and finds his own release. He collapses onto her, breathing heavy and sweat soaked and Elizabeth doesn't care about taking the overwhelming weight of him.

That's when Rodney's voice cuts in. "Elizabeth," he mutters, breathing heavily from his own release. She didn't see when him come, but the evidence of it was there. They'd have to change the bed sheets, she thinks hazily as John lifts his head from the crook of her shoulder and nuzzles her neck lazily. "You're never, ever leaving us again."

Elizabeth laughs, body vibrating. "I guess you guys did miss me."

John freezes for a split second. "Of course we missed you." He pulls back. "For somebody so smart, you can really be thick-headed at times, Elizabeth."

"Soft sciences," Rodney mutters as an explanation, earning a playful slap across the shoulder from Elizabeth.

John pulls out of her and drops to the other side of the bed, leaving her between them. She boneless and tired, and probably going to be sore as hell in the morning, and all she wants right now is to fall asleep. Except they need to clean themselves off and change the bed sheets and probably pull on some clothes for the chilly night.

She doesn't worry about that for a moment, just resting between them. The loneliness and homesickness that has been following her for the last six weeks has finally, mercifully, abated for the moment.

She has lost her home, but maybe that doesn't mean she has to lose her family.

A noise buzzes off in the distance.

"Hey," John announces, reaching for something fallen on the ground. He comes up with a pair of pants, and then retrieves a pager from inside the pocket. "The SGC just paged me."

Two more pagers go off.

\--


End file.
